The senior Wasser was inducted into the Ten Leaders of Matrimonial & Divorce Law of Greater Los Angeles in 2008.

Laura Wasser is today a partner at the firm her father founded, with fellow Ten Leaders inductee Bruce Cooperman. The younger Wasser has established a strong practice representing Hollywood celebrities in divorce.

The Ten Leaders Cooperative, founded in 2002, has profiled more than 1,000 experienced and accomplished divorce lawyers nationwide. Those profiles are widely regarded as the highest quality long-term search-result links for experienced professionals today.

WASHINGTON, D.C. July 31 (TLC News) – The Ten Leaders Cooperative, America’s original promotional cooperative for experienced and qualified professionals, reiterated that it has no plans to allow anonymous posts and other unsourced feedback about members on the 7,500 web pages it publishes, according to Stephen Clark, the cooperative’s director.

“We established our policy of no anonymous posts on member pages in 2005,” said Clark. “We reviewed that policy over the past six months. Despite the explosion of social media and sites allowing anonymous reviews of professionals in recent years, our board decided to retain our current practice of confidentially forwarding email feedback to our members.”

Added Clark, “We’re not interested in free-for-alls” in which anonymous posters try to destroy a professional’s reputation with no risks or consequence to themselves. “Too many anonymous posts nowadays originate from competitors seeking to undermine a rival, from unrealistic clients hanging out their laundry – or from third-party sites consciously trying to blackmail professionals into doing business with them.”

The Ten Leaders Cooperative was founded by Newbridge Media LLC in 2002 in Fort Lee, NJ. It is headquartered today in Reston, VA. Today it has more than 5,000 members who are experienced professionals in medicine, the law and finance.

WASHINGTON, D.C. Oct. 23 (TLC News) – The Ten Leaders Cooperative, America’s original qualified promotional cooperative, recently announced the completion and distribution of profiles of three new members.

Joseph Maceri, a partner at Snyder & Sarno based in Roseland, NJ, was recently inducted into The Ten Leaders of Matrimonial & Divorce Law of New Jersey, Age 45 & Under. Mr. Maceri is head of the firm’s Hackensack, NJ, office.

Leigh Baseheart Kahn is a partner at the Manhattan-based firm of Mayerson, Abramowitz & Kahn, by all accounts one of the leading family law firms in New York City. She was inducted into The Ten Leaders of Matrimonial & Divorce Law of New York City, Age 45 & Under.

NEW YORK, NY Oct. 1 (TLC) – New York City plaintiffs’ lawyer Benedict Morelli represents actor and comedian Tracy Morgan in his civil claim against Wal-Mart, which stems from the June 2014 traffic accident that seriously injured Morgan and left a close friend of his dead.

Morelli was quoted yesterday in The New York Post on the prospects for Morgan’s recovery; Morgan, photographed this week in a wheelchair, is apparently not fully recovered from his injuries. Morelli said “the jury is still out” as to whether Morgan will be able to perform again.

The June accident on the New Jersey Turnpike involved a tractor trailer owned by Wal-Mart, which failed to stop and crashed into the rear of a van limosine occupied by Morgan, friend and fellow comedian James McNair, and two others; McNair was killed in the accident, and Morgan and two others were injured. Reports following the crash indicated that the driver of the tractor trailer had been awake for more than 24 hours.

RESTON, VA Mar 4, 2014 (TLC News) — Since we launched The Ten Leaders Cooperative in 2002, many have asked us to assemble our best Ten Leaders profiles.

Below are ten profiles which, like Ten Leaders groups themselves, are a solid and best-efforts representation. They are of professionals across the spectrum: Lawyers, Surgeons and Finance Professionals. According to TLC Director Stephen Clark, their stories are among the most compelling – in both a professional and personal sense. “They all share a common element: The subjects were willing to speak candidly about themselves – and they allowed us to share that candor,” says Clark. “They trusted us to tell their stories, with little interference or revision. Not everyone does that. I think that candor ultimately benefited them. A powerful narrative has a way of distinguishing people.”

Clark added that “Ten Leaders profiles are intended to make a case the professional is a solid example of his or her profession.” Some of the profiles below are also, well, just good stories:

James Duffy & James Wilkens, Civil Trial & Personal Injury Law, Long Island (Developed 2005) — Jim Duffy runs one of Long Island’s most successful personal-injury and malpractice trial-law boutiques. Duffy, even after 35 years as a lawyer, remains wonderfully unstuffy and straightforward. His story reflects a unique fire and competitiveness, obviously a source of his professional success.

Sarah (Sally) Oldham, Divorce Law, Connecticut (2009) — Many women in the law will relate to the professional story of Sally Oldham, who surmounted many of life’s biggest challenges to create career success on her terms.

Dr. Peter Hetzler, Plastic Surgery, Little Silver, NJ (2005) – Plastic Surgeon Peter Hetzler M.D. is a great example of someone who returned home after getting world-class training – and reaped the benefits. He has run an exemplary hometown practice almost his entire career:

Randy Neumann, Independent Financial Professionals, New Jersey. (2008) People may know Randy Neumann from his years as a referee of heavyweight boxing matches. His story, like Long Island lawyer and ex-pugilist Curtis Exum‘s, is a tale of how competitiveness and perseverance have a way of defining your life and career:

Robert I. Whitelaw, Divorce Law, Greater Philadelphia (2005): Bob Whitelaw is the hard-nosed managing partner of one of Philadelphia’s top firms – yet, with no PR flack sitting in, he was willing to describe his career and life trajectory with powerful candor, rare for a professional of his stature:

Robert Preston, Divorce Law Age 45 & Under, New York City (2012) – Bobby Preston is well known in New York City’s divorce bar. The personal story he shared – remarkable especially given he’s still early in his career – is close to fearless:

Samuel V. Schoonmaker, Divorce Law, Connecticut (2008) – Now retired, Sam Schoonmaker made no bones how he reached the top of Connecticut’s divorce bar – it was luck and timing, he insists, in a profile that also tells the story of one state’s politics of divorce. It helped that he was a tough and smart litigator who could spot talent:

Betty Thompson, Divorce Law, Northern Virginia (2006): We waited for Betty Thompson to return to her Arlington office from a court hearing in 2006 and interviewed her for nearly two hours. In her 80s and practicing for 50 years, Ms. Thompson didn’t hold back: She called her own clients “greedy” and lamented the erosion of honor and decency – not only among lawyers but in society in general. She was a standard bearer. When Betty Thompson died in September 2012, The Washington Post included a portion of her Ten Leaders profile in the obituary:

RESTON, VA Dec. 2 (TLC NEWS) – Keep the conversation positive, don’t stay too long and don’t drink too much – these are the cardinal rules of behavior at the office holiday party, say experts. And one other thing: Never talk about job performance, yours or anyone else’s. People attending the party already have an opinion of all that.

WASHINGTON, D.C. Aug. 23 (TLC News) – Ron Motley, a legendary trial lawyer known for spearheading the $245 billion settlement against the American tobacco industry in the early 90s, died this week in Charleston, S.C. He was 68.

Mr. Motley was inducted into the Ten Leaders of Civil Trial & Personal Injury Law of South Carolina in 2008.

According to The New York Times, Motley “built a fortune out of high-risk cases … leading the litigation team that helped bring about the largest civil settlement in American history” against the tobacco industry.

Several Ten Leaders attorneys, including Christopher Placitella of New Jersey, were part of Motley’s team of lawyers nationally who litigated the settlement against the tobacco industry.

RESTON, VA July 18 (TLC News) – The Ten Leaders Cooperative, America’s original qualified promotional cooperative for experienced professionals, announced this week that it is launching a magazine campaign for The Ten Leaders of Civil Trial & Personal Injury Law of Greater Philadelphia.

The campaign, in Philadelphia Magazine, a monthly magazine, commences in September 2013.

The magazine campaign is the first for a group of civil trial lawyers in the US. The Cooperative currently promotes 43 groups of experienced trial lawyers in regions and states across the US; those groups were researched and created between 2004 and 2011, according to Stephen E. Clark, Director of The Cooperative. Some New York-area groups were advertised in The New York Times from 2004 to 2006, but none were multiple-insertion, long-term campaigns.

The cooperative has conducted ongoing magazine campaigns for some of the cooperative’s 49 matrimonial and divorce lawyer groups across the US. It has also promoted groups in employment law and criminal defense law.

Current campaigns include promotions in Long Island Pulse Magazine, NY Magazine, The Washingtonian Magazine, Philadelphia Magazine and SJ Magazine of South Jersey.

Members can now develop and amend profiles online, with guidance from Ten Leaders editors. All Ten Leaders profiles must meet the Cooperative’s space and style standards, Clark said. The “Member Access” pages — accessible on the tab on the TenLeaders.com navigation bar — are password-protected pages. Members must call the Ten Leaders Cooperative main office, located in Reston, VA, to receive password information.

Since its founding in 2002, the Ten Leaders Cooperative has developed and distributed nearly 1,000 professional profiles in the law, medicine, finance, architecture and technology. Today the Cooperative has more than 5,000 members, both active and inactive.

FAIRFAX, VA (TLC News) –She was a lioness of the Virginia divorce bar, for decades both a fearless litigator and distinctive personality. She practiced in Northern Virginia for 60 years. So when she died of a stroke in late September at age 88 – she never retired — Betty A. Thompson left more than simply a void in the profession. “In a way it feels like the end of an era – a long era,” said David Masterman, a Northern Virginia divorce lawyer who for years opposed Thompson. “And I think we’re starting a new one.” In fact, the Northern Virginia divorce-law community – approaching 200 lawyers, by many estimates — has seen a cascade of change in recent years: Since 2008 prominent older lawyers have retired or scaled back their practices. One-time protégés have launched their own firms. And, with surging economic and population growth in the region, caseloads and court dockets have continued to soar. Divorce flings have more than doubled in Virginia’s four northern counties since 1985, to at least 4,000 divorces annually. And by all accounts the profession has grown even more competitive.